


What Are Stars But Dead Light

by tatarrific



Category: South of Nowhere
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-23
Updated: 2014-10-23
Packaged: 2018-02-22 08:14:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2500850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tatarrific/pseuds/tatarrific





	What Are Stars But Dead Light

Title: What Are Stars But Dead Light  
Author's Name: sugarmomma  
Pairing (if any): Ashley/Spencer  
Words: 3539 (Daaaaamn...)  
Spoilers/Season: Alternate Spashleyverse, but some general knowledge of the show is needed to make sense of things.  
Rating/Warnings: Gen/The lyrics are to the song _So What_ by Mr. DiFranco

 

By the by, this was written for a challenge over at [](http://community.livejournal.com/even_angels_/profile)[**even_angels_**](http://community.livejournal.com/even_angels_/) (Challenge 7, Prompt 1) - they provide you with the opening and a closing sentence, and you fill in the stuff in between.

Well, given that I started off on one tangent, the Muse took me somewhere completely different mid-way through, but I still had to end on a particular note, I am sooooo not happy with how it all ended, but given that I wrote SEVEN pages, I'm posting it anyway. So there. Just a fair warning, I thought.

 

~~~

Another moment passes, slowly sculpted by her breath. She stands and watches them, enshrouded in the early morning darkness, a vague shape outside of the leaping flames of the bonfire. The tip of her cigarette comes to life with another inhale, casts a haphazard, reddish glow on her face, a warning flare. They don't notice. Why should they; the Court is in full swing, all the beautiful people celebrating another meaningless victory. Ashley watches them, draws her sweatshirt tighter around herself. She is not cold, not really; it just feels that way. Another burst of raucous laughter reaches her across the sand and she starts, looks away, flicks her cigarette, moves. In the darkness ahead of her, tongues of a ghost fire still flicker.

Their fire is small, contained. Quiet. When she approaches it, feet shuffling through the sand, no one is talking. The only sounds are the ocean, a sound so vast as to be almost soundless, crackle of the logs and an occasional, muted swirl of liquor in the bottle being passed around. She folds herself down, cross-legged, pulls the guitar case across her knees. It is heavy in her lap, heavier than a skeletal frame of wood and a few strings should be, and she spares it a brief, bitter smile before opening it, exposing the caramel lacquer to the flame-colored darkness. She takes the guitar out.

“Any requests?”

“Yeah.” Sherri shifts in Madison's embrace, stretches, offers her the bottle. “Drink up.”

And she does, gratefully. The bottle is stubby, pear-shaped, but it's the best that money can buy. They may not have much in the daylight but here, amongst embers and sand, under muted stars, they drink like Kings. She raises the bottle, inclines her head in salute. “Chingame, Don Felipe.” She drinks.

Tequila slides into her, leaving warmth in its wake, pools in her stomach, offers a biting satiation. When she opens her eyes, they are still there, far enough that their music is just a muted _thump-thump_ sound, close enough she can distinguish their faces gilded by the flames, limbs warmed by fire. The King High Court is reveling, and Ashley can see Her, their Queen, golden-haired and laughing amongst her attentive pages. She is not cold anymore, though. Meager as it is, their fire sputters defiantly, sending showers of sparks, tufts of smoke-scented warmth across their small circle. It is enough.

Glen nudges her and she gives him the bottle wordlessly, picks up the guitar. She starts strumming mindlessly, letting the song come to her. It will be something damaged, something lonely, but they've never had it any other way. Here they are, Court's Fools, kept within the sight of the royal banquet only for the freakshow amusement they provide to the blue-blooded; a lame basketball player, a lesbian ex-cheerleader and her girlfriend and then there is she – the King's very own offal, she who aborted the heir.

It comes out of her without thought, as always, her fingers picking at the strings, her voice trailing behind, laden and old.

_Who's gonna give a shit_  
 _Who's gonna take the call_  
 _When you find out that the road ahead_  
 _is painted on the wall_  
 _and you're turned up to top volume_  
 _and you're just sitting there in pause_  
 _with your feral little secret_  
 _scratching at you with its claws_  
 _and you're trying hard to figure out_  
 _just exactly how you feel_  
 _before you end up parked and sobbing_  
 _forehead on the steering wheel_

  
“Shit, girl.” Madison looks at her, eyes dark, but offers nothing more. Sherri shifts against her, eyes closed, and Madison threads her fingers through the straight black hair, soothes her. Ashley strums, eyes on the plateau beyond them, the golden people, sees Glen shift out of the corner of her eye, lift the bottle to his lips again.

_Who are you now_  
 _and who were you then_  
 _that you thought somehow_  
 _you could just pretend_  
 _that you could just figure it all out_  
 _the mathematics of regret_  
 _so it takes two beers to remember now_  
 _and five to forget_  
 _that I loved you so_  
 _Yeah, I loved you, so what_

She could see them all back then, as though they still lived that dead life, the trampled past, flickering like ghosts behind her closed eyelids. Flies caught in ember, those younger selves, the un-innocent ones, the golden children of the heyday.

Madison and Sherri. On the shiny parquet they were unstoppable. In the gym after gym in the greater LA area they would grind and gyrate, imbue the overheated air with sex, overpower the scent of sweat and stale dust, muscular bodies. You could try to break down the parts of the performance, the hair, the hip-grinding beats, sinuous movement, pouty lips and heated stares, but it was something they did, the two of them feeding off each other, leading a pack of bland-faced blonde cheerleaders, something that sizzled between them that got the crowd going, night after night. On the shiny parquet they were unstoppable, a show that dazzled, that steamed enough to dampen with uncomfortable desire. Madison and Sherri. The Queens of the game.

And he, their golden King. What he did on the floor, what magic he performed with a bit of inflated leather and a simple hoop, they hadn't seen that before. As in life, the rules were simple, it was all about how you played the game. And Glen was a virtuoso. He was a straight-shooting feinter, a Master of the sleigh-of-hand acrobatics. Off the court he was all-Ohio charm in the California-boy body, but on the court... On the court he ruled with a sure hand, a fleeting foot, Mercurial. He fought his battles on the sly, an underhand shot, the unexpected retreat, a finely-wrought trap for the unsuspecting. Glen loved the game of it, the rush of coming on top, he relished the victory. He relished the victory most of all, on court or off. He had no mercy.

And then there was she. She had had it all once, the King, the Court, the rapt audience. She had had it all, and had wanted none of it. She had no use for the fake adulation, derived no pleasure from the privileges of her position, felt no real desire for her dark haired King. Yes, Aiden had still ruled the King High court then, back then before... Before everything changed. Back then he was hers, and she his. And, yet, she had still felt alone. Empty. Useless. And then, unexpectedly, her kind-hearted King had given her, a girl who thought she had everything and wanted nothing, a gift as beautiful and simple as it was unexpected.

It had taken root within her, tiny and precious, and changed everything. It had given her purpose, it had lain closer to her heart than anything and anyone ever did. It had brought with it hope and a painfully teenaged vision of a happier future, one filled with genuine laughter and simple, uncomplicated pleasures and... Love.

She opens her eyes, fingers hard across the strings, stares into the fire. Tells herself it is the sting of light that makes her eyes water even as the hoarseness of her voice takes over the twang of guitar strings.

_How many times undone_  
 _can one person be_  
 _as they're careening through the facade_  
 _of their favorite fantasy_

When it all unraveled, all of it unraveled at once. The thread along which all of it was strung - the hope, the happiness, final bits of her naiveté - gave out with a sigh and it all, all of it spilled out of her along with bits of tissue and clumped blood in one protracted, bloody cramp. She was in school, of course, when it happened, and the stain of that loss marked each chair in each classroom every day she had to spend there.

It lay a mark on her as well, a magic ink tattoo that, after the sting and burn of the initial application passed, was only visible in certain light, under certain circumstances. When she least expected it, picking up a pizza and running into a surly mother with a toddler on her way out, or stuck in traffic, a peeling, faded 'baby on board' sticker on a rusty car in front of her, it would resurface, that stain, catch the sunlight, burn with it. Ashley learned to brace herself, expect the worst at all times. She learned to like it, be proud of the constant pinch and pull of the sharp-toothed clamp she applied to her heart, her thoughts, her expectations. Freedom, after all, she told herself, was having nothing left to lose.

And then the golden-haired Ohioans came.

_You just close your eyes slowly_  
 _like you're waiting for a kiss_  
 _and hope some lowly little power_  
 _will pull you out of this_

In a small, hermetically sealed universe like theirs there is no such thing as a 'minor' change. Ashley could see the fray in the King High's social fabric right away; a new cheerleader, a new basketball player, a new order. Madison took it well, much better than Aiden did, but Madison had known a thing or two about loss before then. And they, the golden angel-twins, assumed their new roles with ingrained ease and efficiency of those secure in their birthright.

Through it all Ashley stood aside, nearly forgotten, nearly invisible, and observed. Though small and hermetically sealed, their universe was still subject to the same, irrefutable laws as everything else. Change was imminent. New stars flash into being and burn out, are replaced. Even the brightest moon will wane. Nothing stayed the same and yet, one cycle after another, nothing changed but faces, names.

When Glen fell, knee held in place by three pins, Aiden rose up again, it was as simple as that. The Court beckoned to Madison again, shiny parquet and after-school parties offered as spoils of return, but Madison and Sherri had learned the joys of quiet afternoons free of court intrigue. And so it happened, the dark King and the golden Queen came together, an uneasy, novel partnership.

And Ashley watched.

_But none comes at first_  
 _and little comes at all_  
 _and when inspiration finally hits you_  
 _it barely even breaks your fall._

She watched Spencer in class, the blonde lost in thought, eyes downcast, saw the tilt of her head, the purse of the lips of someone questioning, someone doubting without knowing what they were unsure of. Ashley observed her during lunch, perched on the table under the sun, outshining it, surrounded by the green cheerleading uniforms, all her beautiful pages enthralled; a Queen on her throne. And yet it was there to the trained ear – her laughter just a touch too loud, slightly too long – the silences that followed told Ashley more than anything she ever overheard Spencer say.

When Glen hobbled over to her table during lunch one day, and sat down wordlessly, Ashley accepted it as a given. In their new order, the pieces were still falling together, settling. So she observed. She saw the lingering glances Spencer would direct to her brother, his back always turned to her, hunched over his meal, the fleeting perusal she herself earned. At the parties she would go to, her back to the corner, plastic cup to her lips, she noticed the jumpy, restless quality of Spencer's gaze, eyes of someone looking for something, anything to catch her interest. When at one of the parties Madison and Sherri paused in passing, held up a joint in a soundless offer, Ashley followed, accepting her new position in the alignment of their little universe. And she watched.

_Who were you then_  
 _and who are you_  
 _now that you can't pretend_  
 _that you can figure it all out._

She noticed when Spencer's step took on a halting quality every time she crossed paths with Ashley. She noticed when it was she who started receiving the lingering glances, and Glen only a fleeting perusal. She noticed the deeper frowns, the longer silences, the tumultuous nature of Spencer's reverie, the subtle blush that would grace her cheeks, her neck when she would start out of it. She noticed when Spencer became aware of her perusal, unsettled by it. She noticed when Spencer started welcoming it, inviting it. Ashley noticed everything but how rusted the teeth of her own emotional clamp had become, how weak. Ashley didn't notice when it opened up, gave out with a sigh, unbuckling her.

When Spencer rose from her seat during lunch one day, passed by her adoring, beautiful pages and walked to their table, when she sat down next to Sherri with a timid smile, they accepted it with the quiet wisdom of those who made peace with the unexpected.

It was only when Ashley looked into those eyes across the span of a splintered tabletop, saw the question in them, felt herself answer it instinctually, without thought, it was only then that she felt the lack of support that her brittle pain offered her for so long, it was only then that she felt herself naked, vulnerable.

_Subtract out the impact_  
 _and the fall is all you get_

It didn't happen like in a fairytale. Ashley knew well enough to know that even fairlytales don't happen like in fairytales. They approached each other haltingly, stumbling over hellos and talk of weather, they confused themselves and each other with nonsensical proclamations on friendship and family. They retreated often, falling back on old habits, fulfilling given duties, the Queen and the Pauper. No, it didn't happen like in a fairytale.

_So it takes two beers to remember now_  
 _and three more to forget_  
 _that I loved you so_

When they finally kissed, it was out of frustration. They would see each other at a beach parties, and would start another game of cat and mouse across the bonfire-studded sand. They would approach each other's circle tentatively, shuffle through an awkward conversation, rush through a drink and then retreat, embarrassed and unsure, to the safety of their own fire. Only in the dark spaces in between the pyres, the no-man's land lit by firmament alone were they able to meet and linger, slow their walk, pretend it was the darkness that led their hands to brush against each other repeatedly.

Darkness stripped them of the distinctions of their office, of their separate burdens, covered up their divergent paths. For a while, pausing between the flames, they were just two girls, tentative and unsure, trying to find their way to each other by touch and hearing alone. There never seemed to be enough time or enough privacy for anything more to develop, never enough courage before another interruption. Back in the social circle of their fires, in the daylight, they reverted to sharing telling, bitter-sweet smiles and simple hellos, and waited for another night, for another coat of darkness.

When they kissed the first time, it was out of frustration. Spencer had come over as Ashley was strumming her guitar wordlessly, had looked at her from across the fire with a kind of hunger, a kind of longing Ashley was certain Spencer would be shocked to realize herself capable of, and had turned and walked away wordlessly at the end of the song. When Ashley followed her, stepping deeper into the shadows, she had felt the hunger stir within her as well, had tried to tamp down on the longing. In the darkness Spencer was a head-bent sillhouette, a silver-haired sparkle under the stars. Ashley had reached towards her, let her fingers skitter down the length of a chilled arm, felt her guitar-bruised fingertips soothe the goosebumps that sprung up underneath them.

She had opened her mouth, had uttered a question and a prayer: _“Spencer?”_ , had seen the girl raise her eyes towards her in response. They had leaned in closer, unable, unwilling to see in the darkness and then, startling them, breaking them apart, a lonely, long howl of Spencer's name reached them from the big bonfire. The Queen was being summoned back to her court.

Spencer had stepped back, shaken, had said _“I have to go-”_ , and Ashley felt the spring of her longing uncoil itself within her with a broken twang, propel her forward. She had sank her fingers into the spun gold of Spencer's hair, had pressed their lips together, felt them share a sigh of desire on a hitched breath. Felt them both recoil at the frightening strength of it, the brutal need revealed. They had mimicked each other then, raising a trembling hand to a bruised mouth, the other to a seizing heart, had stumbled backwards, walked away.

The burn of that kiss, that discovery transformed the darkness for them. Not safe anymore, the dark, not a comfort. In the dark, in the aftermath of that kiss, Ashley felt the rusted teeth of her fear bite into her soft tissues again, heard the steel trap of it against Spencer's bones. In the well-rehearsed order of their little universe there was no room, no precedent for the kind of alignment she and Spencer were creating. The discovery of the true strength of their attraction jolted them, pushed them back into their safe, wobbly orbiting tracks, at a safe distance from each other. In their universe, as the shock of their lips meeting led them to discover, their tale was one of the 'crash and burn' variety, a fiery end the only option. After that, their self-inflicted Judas kiss, they kept to their own fires, chilled by their leaping flames, unwilling or unable to abdicate the comfortable, numbing shelter of their fear.

_Yeah I loved you,_  
 _so what_

When she puts the guitar back into the case, she is careful not to get any sand on it. She notices that she has assumed the deliberate, exaggerated motions of someone walking in a darkened room, someone afraid of sharp edges and stubbed toes, even when she does the most mundane things. The guitar case shuts with a satisfying click, and when she looks up, so does her heart.

She is standing just inside the circle of their fire,and the broken, tittering light of the flames leaps up her calves and thighs, tangles in the dark of her sweatshirt, is reborn in the golden waterfall of her hair. Ashley glances past her, dry-mouthed, looks at the other, bigger bonfire of the golden people, finds them gazing back at her, quieted. When Spencer moves, when she kneels next to her, all Ashley can do is close her eyes, inhale the smoky scent of her hair. When Spencer eases the guitar case off her lap, lays it aside, Ashley feels the chill of fear, sways under a breath of hope. Then the warmth of the fire is eclipsed by the feeling of Spencer settling against her, shoulder to shoulder, thighs touching. She opens her eyes, settles her gaze on the expanse of their skin touching, sees her leg twitch in response.

“Pass me the bottle?”

She exhales, nods, eyes still averted, turns to her left in a halting, mechanical motion. Glen is holding up the bottle wordlessly, and she takes it from him and swings it towards Spencer in one move, nearly groans under the need to move, put some distance between them. When she feels Spencer's fingers ghost down her forearm she nearly drops the bottle, but Spencer's other hand is there to take it, and then all Ashley can do is watch as slender fingers slide across her wrist, and tangle with her own. She can't avoid it then, and when she lookes at Spencer, a hand's breadth away, she sees fear. She sees how blue her eyes truly are. She sees determination. Desire. She can't stop looking.

Then Spencer smiles at her, and brings their hands over to her lap, presses them against her stomach, raises the bottle with her free hand. “Fuck 'em all.” And she drinks.

As salutes go, it is imperfect, clumsy, and Ashley sees a golden trickle of tequila snake its way down Spencer's cheek, into her hair. She feels it stir within her then, something so large and new, something big enough to eclipse their entire small universe, strong enough to bring down the Court. Simple enough to go unnoticed but for fingers pressing against each other, a squeeze given and returned, a quiet affirmation.

Ashley glances across the sand, wonders if the Court has felt the tectonic shift, the new order. The dark King gazes back at her, and she imagines a small, quiet smile on his lips, sees him lift his bottle in salute. _Long Live the Queen_ , it says. Spencer shifts against her, warm and unconcerned. Ways away, at the big bonfire, Her most beautiful pages grow distracted, and shiver.


End file.
